Vodka and Saxophone
by rampage tonberry
Summary: Gren plays his sad song, playing to a mysterious figure in a black cloak, who is linked to his past by a fragile chain... Smoke Series. Contains yaoi. AU principles, now listed.
1. Intro

Introduction  
  
Vodka and Saxophone is one in a series of AU, "What Ifs" applied on top of the exsisting Cowboy Bebop Universe. The website http://www.geocities.com/smokeseries/SmokeHome.html explains the various principles that apply to this world. There are changes, some drastic, but all with their perfectly good reasons, so I'd suggest going to read up about them. Otherwise, don't flame me for OOC charachters. Because they might not be quite the same as you remember them...  
  
  
A. The Sister:  
The suggestion that Vicious has a twin sister named Talena. Many of the What Ifs are the direct result of Talena, or the indirect result. More on Talena on her page, look to your left...  
  
A1. The Good Vicious:  
Having a sister, theoretically, would have changed Vicious, so he would be less cold and less violent. He would become, in short, a "good guy".  
  
A2. The Spike/Vicious:  
Talena would have found a way to make Vicious notice his feelings for Spike in time for him to do something about them. So when A2 is invoked, Spike and Vicious have been a couple.  
  
A4. The Titan Incident 2:  
That Vicious did in fact fight on Titan, and befriended Grenecia Mars Elijah Guo Eckner, because Gren was willing to listen to Vicious speak of his comrades from home. Vicious did betray Gren, but it was for the good of the syndicate.  
  
A5. Grenecia Mars Elijah Guo Eckner  
Because of the positive Vicious in Gren's life, if he appears in Gren's life, Gren never got addicted to the drug that caused his hormonal balance to alter, he stuck to red-eye, when he used that. So any story using Gren is clear-cut yaoi or het, depending.  
  
B1. Julia:  
Because Shadow was brought into the Dragons, there was not a spot for Julia. She never became a Red Dragon, and never met Spike, Vicious, or anyone else related.   
  
B2. Also Julia:  
When B2 is invoked, Julia became a bounty hunter and is living with Jet and Faye. Also when B2 is invoked is Julia involved with Faye.  
  
J1. Since Vicious is now a "nice guy", he's not on drugs and he's not vindictive, so he wasn't the one who injured Gren. Instead, that was Julia on her own drug deal or something.  
  
Gender Reverse- In the original works about these charachters, Shadow and Talena were both female. In this writing, they are male, and Talena is referred to as Talon.  
  
----  
-Fira  
Good Luck.  
Understand it please.  
I hope you can. 


	2. Part 1

Vodka and Saxophone, Part 1  
  
The green-haired figure didn't even have to murmur what it wanted to drink. The bartender of the Rester House, on Callisto, reached for a glass, pouring a double shot of vodka, adding ice. Ice in a drink, even on Callisto. The green-haired figure wore all black, under a black cloak, and it was impossible to tell anything about it, except for the green hair, dark glasses even on dark, snowy Callisto, and preference of black. A careful observer would note that the figure moved like a fighter- each step carefully calculated, each motion guarded. A less careful observer would note the obvious suicidal depression that hung in a cloud, along with the cigarette smoke, around the figure. The figure murmured thanks to the bartender, pulling out a pack of cigarettes, lighting up one. He, or she, for it was difficult to tell, had intentionally come just in time for Gren, the saxophonist, to start playing.   
  
Gren's story was somewhat of a local legend. A bounty hunter named Julia had wounded him to the point of near-death. And somehow he'd come back to life or something. He'd say that he was healed on Titan, but… Nobody seemed to want to believe. They just loved good stories, and a miracle was definitely one of them. There wasn't much cause for hope for miracles on Callisto. And so the raven-haired man set up in the back of the bar, and played his sad song for hours. Gren, too, had an unsung story.  
  
Gren had gotten involved in the Titan Wars. He was searching for a purpose, for meaning, in those days. He had thought that fighting in a war would give him purpose. All he found was a comrade who he fell in love with, a mafia man by the name of Vicious. But Vicious had always been distant, cold, somehow. Gren managed to find out that the man was just lonely, missed his brother, his friend, and his lover. And so Gren gave up all hope of becoming involved with the cold mafia man, but never stopped feeling the way that he felt. Not even after Vicious betrayed him, could he stop being in love with the soldier.  
  
Those were the emotions in the music, and the green haired figure seemed to emulate them, in the way it smoked, and in the way it drank, drowning sorrow and regret in vodka and saxophone. And tonight, Gren wasn't sure why, but he played long after closing hours, curious about the dark figure, that barley recognized the fact that the room was almost empty. The saxophonist wrapped up his improvisational jazz riff, and in the silence the lone figure extinguished the last cigarette from his pack on his wrist, not even noticing the pain of the burn.   
  
"Don't…" Gren cried out, not noticing fast enough to stop the cigarette from branding skin.  
"Don't… what?" The voice said, barley above a whisper. It was the voice of a scarred soul, the voice of someone who wanted to die.  
Gren put his saxophone in it's case, picking up his coat, and walking to sit on the bar stool next to the cloaked figure.  
"I was going to tell you not to do that, to your hand," said Gren, softly, reaching to examine the burn on the figure's left hand.  
The figure drew it's hand away, then, held up the hand, pulling the edge of a black glove up so that Gren could see three deep circular burns. They weren't perfect, not like if they'd only been burned once. Instead, each one had obviously felt wounds every night, one every time this lost soul finished a cigarette.  
"Why do you…" Gren trailed off.   
"I had three comrades in my life. Three only. And they were killed, all at once. I was the only one left alive, and that was because I wasn't alert enough, I hadn't seen their deaths coming," the voice rasped.   
"That's why… is that why you listen to my music, because it sums up the loss and pain you must feel?"  
"I came to Callisto to die. Listening to your music will be my last consent to life." The figure mumbled.   
"I lost someone once… someone very dear to me. I loved him, but he didn't die… He betrayed me. A man named Vicious. That's why I'm here."  
"Vicious?… Silver hair, cold…"  
"The same. You know him?"  
"Knew him… Yes, I knew him." The figure looked down at the middle burn, touching it.  
"He was… one of your… comrades?"  
"Yes. I… loved his brother. I was like a sibling to the one he loved."  
"Spike, then? And his brother… Talon, was it? You must be… Shadow."  
"He spoke of us then, on Titan?" Cynically amused, though still depressed and raspy, Shadow, spoke.   
"He spoke of little else. Dead, then?" Gren said with a heavy heart.  
"All."  
"…Look, it's getting late. We should continue this back at my apartment." Gren shrugged. The soldier had know Vicious.  
  
And so silently the two walked up to the apartments. Gren carried his saxophone case, and Shadow smoked another cigarette. The cigarette sputtered and went out as the perpetual drizzle became a downpour. As they passed silently through the deserted streets, neither of them quickened the pace from a steady walk. Gren assumed that Shadow could still hear the saxophone music playing in his ears, just like he could. But what Gren missed in the rain was a tear rolling down Shadow's cheek.  
  
----  
-Fira  
Angst, angst.   
It doesn't stop.  
The next segment continues.  
Love brings too many tears. 


	3. Part 2

Vodka and Saxophone, Part 2  
  
20 minutes found them in his apartment. Gren poured heated brandy into glasses, unaware of just how much Shadow had already drunk that evening, not that Shadow was keeping track.   
  
"I didn't catch your name," murmured Shadow.  
"Well, the whole thing is Grenecia Mars Elijah Guo Eckner, but… most people just call me Gren."  
"Gren… Vicious spoke of you." The voice got harsh again, as it did whenever Shadow spoke of his "lost comrades".  
"He spoke of… me?" Shock, and amazement, in washed-out tones, played through his voice.  
"Yes, he said you were the only comrade he had on Titan."  
"That's only because he only said what he had to, before you got to know him. No one else took the time to understand him, hear what he didn't say. He tolerated me, because I let him talk about his home, back on Mars. I don't know why he told me all he did, but…"  
"Talon's influence, most likely. Sometimes I wonder what Vicious would be like without him… He'd be locked away in his ideas about power and strength… He wouldn't have spoken of us if not for Tal's influence, surely." His voice caught, snagged on the word "Tal", as if it wanted to keep that syllable forever, and slowed down to complete the thought.  
"He loved him a lot. He never used those words, but… I could tell. The same for Spike. He never said he loved him, I could just tell. About you… He only brought up the name 'Shadow' around the context of his brother. You said you loved him?"  
"As my life. As my life, when I still had will to live it. But you should know how that was, loving a man like that, I mean, you loved his twin, so…" His voice had gone from harsh to soft, the fond side of raw angst showing itself.  
"I do know how you feel, or at least I can guess."  
Shadow leaned across the table, to whisper in Gren's ear.  
"We're the same, you and I… aren't we? The same in love?" And he started to sit back, but instead kissed Gren hard on the mouth, as if a sudden decision made in a second, as if he'd been going to do something else. And something about Shadow, Gren couldn't figure out what, made him unable to back away, unable to stop it. He hadn't felt like this in a long time, not since Titan, and as Shadow reached over to entangle his hand in Gren's hair, he knew that he could fall in love with Shadow as easily as he had Vicious. They were the same breed of men, but Shadow was a different color. Vicious had been pure, like he'd walked through everything and none of it had effected him, tainted him. Shadow was of the streets, like the same man had been covered in soot. And it was very intoxicating soot.  
  
Shadow reached his hand in between the two, unbuttoning Gren's shirt, sliding his hands across his thin frame. Gren reached up, and took the dark glasses off of Shadow's eyes, revealing eyes the color green of his hair. The eyes blinked in surprise, then closed as Shadow put his attention back to Gren's mouth, and to his hands, which were finishing with the shirt.   
  
Gren stood up, and he pulled Shadow into his bedroom, not bothering to turn on the light. Shadow pushed Gren flat onto the bed, and lay down sideways next to him, tracing out Gren's abs and pecs painfully slowly, making every second into three. Gren pushed Shadow's shirt up over his head, ran his hands all along Shadow's scarred, burned, and mutilated body. He sat up, running his fingers over every wound, as if touching them would heal them. Vulnerable now, with his scars all open, Shadow let Gren have complete control, removing the rest of his clothing, and stripping himself, so both men were nude. The raven-haired man took a hand that belonged to the green-haired man and pressed it to his chest. Shadow felt a scar that spiraled out across Gren's entire chest, and gasped.  
  
"What was…"  
"You're not the only one with scars, you know. That one was from a woman who shot a missile at my ship because I'd refused to sell her the red eye in my possession. I thought I was going to die. But I got to Titan, and they healed me." Gren pulled Shadow close. "Sometimes you've just got to survive, Shadow. I wanted to die, but I was saved. You want to die, now, but I'm not going to let you. You're going to survive with me here."   
  
Shadow's bright green eyes felt additional moisture yet again as he kissed Gren fiercly.   
  
"I'll live for you."  
  
----  
-Fira  
Angst concludes.  
It will return.  
It comes with love. 


End file.
